Filing Cabinet

An open filing cabinet stands on the concrete floor of the former Sundell Motors workshop on Smith Street, Chatswood. Its drawers have been pulled out and left that way, each one empty. Dust has settled across the metal surfaces. Whatever was filed here, service records, dealer correspondence, job sheets, is long gone. Sundell Motors Pty Ltd was registered with ASIC on 5 January 1967 (ACN 000 560 770) and operated as an authorised Holden dealer under dealer code 610, assigned to Chatswood, NSW. The Smith Street site functioned as the network's primary workshop and service centre, distinct from the company's earlier Pacific Highway showroom. By 2018, four Sundell entities had been consolidated under the single company name Sundell Motors Pty Ltd. The business operated as part of a multi-branch dealer group across Sydney's North Shore. On 17 February 2020, General Motors announced the withdrawal of the Holden brand from Australia and New Zealand. Sundell was one of 185 Holden dealers whose franchise was terminated. The ACCC intervened on 22 May 2020, after dealers raised concerns about the pressure to accept compensation packages on an unreasonably short timeline. At least 120 of the 185 dealers accepted packages by the 30 June 2020 deadline; total compensation across the network was close to $150 million. The Holden brand ceased trading in Australia on 31 December 2020. The Smith Street building stood vacant in the period between closure and demolition around 2021. During that window it accumulated layers of street art and graffiti. Willoughby City Council approved a development application for the site in March 2021; the Woolworths Chatswood East supermarket that replaced it opened on 26 October 2022. This photograph was made in 2015, inside that vacancy. The cabinet is all that fills the frame.